The present invention relates generally to a wireless communication system. More specifically, the present invention relates to a synchronization technique for a multi-platform wireless communication system that provides for the delivery of signals to an intended recipient coherently and completely in-phase.
Current mobile satellite communication systems, such as Iridium, Globalstar, and ICO, utilize low-cost user terminals as one of their key system features. To maintain communications linkage with these current mobile systems, the system satellites provide multiple beam and high-gain services to the subscribers. The low-cost and low-gain hand-held terminals utilized by the users of these systems, transmit and receive signals to and from high performance satellites which populate almost the entire hemisphere. Some of these current systems require access to at least two satellites to assure a soft hand-over process as the satellites progress from horizon to horizon. As a result, the satellite system becomes more reliable and available as more satellites come into a user""s field of view (FOV). The satellite constellations provided by these current systems are thus sized to guarantee a minimum number of satellites within a user""s FOV over large coverage areas at all times.
All of these current mobile satellite communication systems, however, suffer from certain disadvantages. First, they all have limited frequency (the term xe2x80x9cfrequencyxe2x80x9d is generalized herein to refer to frequency, time slot or CDMA code) resources. Any given frequency over a given ground position can only be utilized by one user at a time. Thus, if one user accesses a satellite using a particular frequency slot to communicate to his counterpart on network, other satellites and/or users in the same region cannot reuse the same frequency resource in the same local area. In particular, if a nearby secondary user has a handset that requires the same frequency resources as is being utilized by the first user, the second user is unable to access the system, even via different satellites. This is true regardless of the sophistication of the system, including systems that utilize multiple beam satellite designs. Even when multiple satellites are available at a given geographic location, the same frequency spectrum cannot be used by more than one user in a local area. The availability of multiple satellites merely serves to increase the availability of the system to the user. However, the total capacity of these mobile communication satellite systems is still limited by their inefficient usage of the available frequency resources. Thus, the potential growth of these current satellite communication systems is inherently limited.
Additionally, current telecommunications systems generally allow only mobile-to-hub and hub-to-mobile communications in most low earth orbit and medium earth orbit mobile satellite constellations. Mobile-to-mobile linkages require multiple hops between hubs. This means that two or more frequency resources must be committed by the system to close the links.
It is clearly desirable to provide a mobile communication satellite system that relaxes the above constraints, and more efficiently utilizes current mobile satellite communication system resources, while also providing much greater opportunity for system growth.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is an object of the present invention to provide a wireless communication system with reduced limitations on frequency re-use for point-to-point communications.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a wireless communication system that utilizes individual transponders and mobile terminals that are relatively simple and of low complexity.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a wireless communication system with high system reliability through graceful degradation.
It is still another object of the present invention to provide a multi-transponder wireless communication system that allows flexible combination of user types.
It is a related object of the present invention to provide a multi-transponder wireless communication system with better utilization of total system resources.
It is yet a further object of the present invention to provide a synchronization process for user signals in multi-platform applications.
In accordance with the above and other objects of the present invention, a multi-platform wireless communication system is provided. The wireless communication system includes a plurality of individual communication transponding nodes. The plurality of individual transponding nodes are each in communication with a ground hub such that a signal processed by the ground hub in the forward link is radiated with compensating time delays to one or more of the plurality of individual transponders. The radiated signals are then re-radiated by the plurality of individual transponders and coherently received and processed by a mobile user terminal. The return link signal path is the reverse of the forward link.
In accordance with another object of the present invention, a method for synchronizing user signals such that they arrive at the location of an intended recipient in-phase is provided. The system includes a plurality of individual transponding nodes and a plurality of mobile users each having a respective mobile terminal. A ground hub establishes a link between at least one of the mobile terminals through one or more of the plurality of transponding nodes. A plurality of user signals are transferred to and from the central hub. The central hub synchronizes the relative arrival of PN encoded data in the user signals to within a fraction of a chip in both a forward link and a return link. The central hub synchronizes the carrier phase of said user signals to within a fraction of a wavelength in both the forward and return links.
In accordance with yet another object of the present invention, the system includes a plurality of individual transponding nodes. The system also includes a plurality of individual resource cells, each associated with a particular one of the plurality of individual transponding nodes and a particular one of the plurality of available codes. The system further includes a plurality of mobile terminals of different types, each of which is assigned to operate in one or more of the plurality of individual resource cells.
These and other features of the present invention will become apparent from the following description of the invention, when viewed in accordance with the accompanying drawings and appended claims.